The Character and Influence of the Indian Trade in Wisconsin Part 8

[Footnote 206: See the objections of British traders, Mich. Pioneer Colls., XVI., 76 ff. The Northwest Company tried to induce the British government to construe the treaty so as to prevent the United States from erecting the forts, urging that a fort at Prairie du Chien would "deprive the Indians of their 'rights and privileges'", guaranteed by the treaty.]

GOVERNMENT TRADING HOUSES.

The system of public trading houses goes back to colonial days. At first in Plymouth and Jamestown all industry was controlled by the commonwealth, and in Ma.s.sachusetts Bay the stock company had reserved the trade in furs for themselves before leaving England.[207] The trade was frequently farmed out, but public "truck houses" were established by the latter colony as early as 1694-5.[208] Franklin, in his public dealings with the Ohio Indians, saw the importance of regulation of the trade, and in 1753 he wrote asking James Bowdoin of Ma.s.sachusetts to procure him a copy of the truckhouse law of that colony, saying that if it had proved to work well he thought of proposing it for Pennsylvania.[209] The reply of Bowdoin showed that Ma.s.sachusetts furnished goods to the Indians at wholesale prices and so drove out the French and the private traders. In 1757 Virginia adopted the system for a time,[210] and in 1776 the Continental Congress accepted a plan presented by a committee of which Franklin was a member,[211] whereby 140,000 sterling was expended at the charge of the United Colonies for Indian goods to be sold at moderate prices by factors of the congressional commissioners.[212] The bearing of this act upon the governmental powers of the Congress is worth noting.

In his messages of 1791 and 1792 President Was.h.i.+ngton urged the need of promoting and regulating commerce with the Indians, and in 1793 he advocated government trading houses. Pickering, of Ma.s.sachusetts, who was his Secretary of War with the management of Indian affairs, may have strengthened Was.h.i.+ngton in this design, for he was much interested in Indian improvement, but Was.h.i.+ngton's own experience had shown him the desirability of some such plan, and he had written to this effect as early as 1783.[213] The objects of Congressional policy in dealing with the Indians were stated by speakers in 1794 as follows:[214] 1.

Protection of the frontiersmen from the Indians, by means of the army.

2. Protection of the Indians from the frontiersmen, by laws regulating settlement. 3. Detachment of the Indians from foreign influence, by trading houses where goods could be got cheaply. In 1795 a small appropriation was made for trying the experiment of public trading houses,[215] and in 1796, the same year that the British evacuated the posts, the law which established the system was pa.s.sed.[216] It was to be temporary, but by re-enactments with alterations it was prolonged until 1822, new posts being added from time to time. In substance the laws provided a certain capital for the Indian trade, the goods to be sold by salaried United States factors, at posts in the Indian country, at such rates as would protect the savage from the extortions of the individual trader, whose actions sometimes provoked hostilities, and would supplant British influence over the Indian. At the same time it was required that the capital stock should not be diminished. In the course of the debate over the law in 1796 considerable _laissez faire_ sentiment was called out against the government's becoming a trader, notwithstanding that the purpose of the bill was benevolence and political advantage rather than financial gain.[217] President Jefferson and Secretary Calhoun were friends of the system.[218] It was a failure, however, and under the attacks of Senator Benton, the Indian agents and the American Fur Company, it was brought to an end in 1822. The causes of its failure were chiefly these:[219] The private trader went to the hunting grounds of the savages, while the government's posts were fixed.

The private traders gave credit to the Indians, which the government did not.[220] The private trader understood the Indians, was related to them by marriage, and was energetic and not over-scrupulous. The government trader was a salaried agent not trained to the work. The private trader sold whiskey and the government did not. The British trader's goods were better than those of the government. The best business principles were not always followed by the superintendent. The system was far from effecting its object, for the Northwestern Indians had been accustomed to receive presents from the British authorities, and had small respect for a government that traded. Upon Wisconsin trade from 1814 to 1822 its influence was slight.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 207: Ma.s.s. Coll. Recs., I., 55: III., 424.]

[Footnote 208: Acts and Resolves of the Prov. of Ma.s.s. Bay, I., 172.]

[Footnote 209: Bigelow, Franklin's Works, II., 316, 221. A plan for public trading houses came before the British ministry while Franklin was in England, and was commented upon by him for their benefit.]

[Footnote 210: Hening, Statutes, VII., 116.]

[Footnote 211: Journals of Congress, 1775, pp. 162, 168, 247.]

[Footnote 212: _Ibid._, 1776, p. 41.]

[Footnote 213: Ford's Was.h.i.+ngton's Writings, X., 309.]

[Footnote 214: Annals of Cong., IV., 1273; cf. _ibid._, V., 231.]

[Footnote 215: Amer. State Papers, Ind. Affs., I., 583.]

[Footnote 216: Annals of Cong., VI., 2889.]

[Footnote 217: Annals of Congress, V., 230 ff., 283; Abridgment of Debates, VII., 187-8.]

[Footnote 218: Amer. State Papers, Ind. Affs., I., 684; II., 181.]

[Footnote 219: Amer. State Papers, VI., Ind. Affs., II., 203; Ind.

Treaties, 399 _et seq._; Wis. Hist. Colls., VII., 269; _Was.h.i.+ngton Gazette_, 1821, 1822, articles by Ramsay Crooks under signature "Backwoodsman," and speech of Tracy in House of Representatives, February 23, 1821; Benton, Thirty Years View; _id._, Abr. Deb., VII., 1780.]

[Footnote 220: To understand the importance of these two points see _post_, pp. 62-5.]

WISCONSIN TRADE IN 1820.[221]

The goods used in the Indian trade remained much the same from the first, in all sections of the country.[222] They were chiefly blankets, coa.r.s.e cloths, cheap jewelry and trinkets (including strings of wampum), fancy goods (like ribbons, shawls, etc.), kettles, knives, hatchets, guns, powder, tobacco, and intoxicating liquor.[223] These goods, s.h.i.+pped from Mackinaw, at first came by canoes or bateaux,[224] and in the later period by vessel, to a leading post, were there redivided[225]

and sent to the various trading posts. The Indians, returning from the hunting grounds to their villages in the spring,[226] set the squaws to making maple sugar,[227] planting corn, watermelons, potatoes, squashes, etc., and a little hunting was carried on. The summer was given over to enjoyment, and in the early period to wars. In the autumn they collected their wild rice, or their corn, and again were ready to start for the hunting grounds, sometimes 300 miles distant. At this juncture the trader, licensed by an Indian agent, arrived upon the scene with his goods, without which no family could subsist, much less collect any quant.i.ty of furs.[228] These were bought on credit by the hunter, since he could not go on the hunt for the furs, whereby he paid for his supplies, without having goods and ammunition advanced for the purpose.

This system of credits,[229] dating back to the French period, had become systematized so that books were kept, with each Indian's account.

The amount to which the hunter was trusted was between $40 and $50, at cost prices, upon which the trader expected a gain of about 100 per cent, so that the average annual value of furs brought in by each hunter to pay his credits should have been between $80 and $100.[230] The amount of the credit varied with the reputation of the hunter for honesty and ability in the chase.[231] Sometimes he was trusted to the amount of three hundred dollars. If one-half the credits were paid in the spring the trader thought that he had done a fair business. The importance of this credit system can hardly be overestimated in considering the influence of the fur trade upon the Indians of Wisconsin, and especially in rendering them dependent upon the earlier settlements of the State.

The system left the Indians at the mercy of the trader when one nation monopolized the field, and it compelled them to espouse the cause of one or other when two nations contended for supremacy over their territory.

At the same time it rendered the trade peculiarly adapted to monopoly, for when rivals competed, the trade was demoralized, and the Indian frequently sold to a new trader the furs which he had pledged in advance for the goods of another. When the American Fur Company gained control, they systematized matters so that there was no compet.i.tion between their own agents, and private dealers cut into their trade but little for some years. The unit of trade was at first the beaver skin, or, as the pound of beaver skin came to be called, the "plus."[232] The beaver skin was estimated at a pound and a half, though it sometimes weighed two, in which case an allowance was made. Wampum was used for ornament and in treaty-making, but not as currency. Other furs or Indian commodities, like maple sugar and wild rice, were bought in terms of beaver. As this animal grew scarcer the unit changed to money. By 1820, when few beaver were marketed in Wisconsin, the term plus stood for one dollar.[233] The muskrat skin was also used as the unit in the later days of the trade.[234] In the southern colonies the pound of deer skin had answered the purpose of a unit.[235]

The goods being trusted to the Indians, the bands separated for the hunting grounds. Among the Chippeways, at least, each family or group had a particular stream or region where it exclusively hunted and trapped.[236] Not only were the hunting grounds thus parcelled out; certain Indians were apportioned to certain traders,[237] so that the industrial activities of Wisconsin at this date were remarkably systematic and uniform. Sometimes the trader followed the Indians to their hunting grounds. From time to time he sent his engages (hired men), commonly five or six in number, to the various places where the hunting bands were to be found, to collect furs on the debts and to sell goods to those who had not received too large credits, and to the customers of rival traders; this was called "running a deouine."[238]

The main wintering post had lesser ones, called "jack-knife posts,"[239]

depending on it, where goods were left and the furs gathered in going to and from the main post. By these methods Wisconsin was thoroughly visited by the traders before the "pioneers" arrived.[240]

The kind and amount of furs brought in may be judged by the fact that in 1836, long after the best days of the trade, a single Green Bay firm, Porlier and Grignon, s.h.i.+pped to the American Fur Company about 3600 deer skins, 6000 muskrats, 150 bears, 850 racc.o.o.ns, besides beavers, otters, fishers, martens, lynxes, foxes, wolves, badgers, skunks, etc., amounting to over $6000.

None of these traders became wealthy; Astor's company absorbed the profits. It required its clerks, or factors, to pay an advance of 81-1/2 per cent on the sterling cost of the blankets, strouds, and other English goods, in order to cover the cost of importation and the expense of transportation from New York to Mackinaw. Articles purchased in New York were charged with 15-1/3 per cent advance for transportation, and each cla.s.s of purchasers was charged with 33-1/3 per cent advance as profit on the aggregate amount.[241]

I estimate, from the data given in the sources cited on page 63, note, that in 1820 between $60,000 and $75,000 worth of goods was brought annually to Wisconsin for the Indian trade. An average outfit for a single clerk at a main post was between $1500 and $2000, and for the dependent posts between $100 and $500. There were probably not over 2000 Indian hunters in the State, and the total Indian population did not much exceed 10,000. Comparing this number with the early estimates for the same tribes, we find that, if the former are trustworthy, by 1820 the Indian tribes that remained in Wisconsin had increased their numbers. But the material is too unsatisfactory to afford any valuable conclusion.

After the sale of their lands and the receipt of money annuities, a change came over the Indian trade. The monopoly held by Astor was broken into, and as compet.i.tion increased, the sales of whiskey were larger, and for money, which the savage could now pay. When the Indians went to Montreal in the days of the French, they confessed that they could not return with supplies because they wasted their furs upon brandy. The same process now went on at their doors. The traders were not dependent upon the Indian's success in hunting alone; they had his annuities to count on, and so did not exert their previous influence in favor of steady hunting. Moreover, the game was now exploited to a considerable degree, so that Wisconsin was no longer the hunter's paradise that it had been in the days of Dablon and La Salle. The long-settled economic life of the Indian being revolutionized, his business honesty declined, and credits were more frequently lost. The annuities fell into the traders' hands for debts and whiskey. "There is no less than near $420,000 of claims against the Winnebagoes," writes a Green Bay trader at Prairie du Chien, in 1838, "so that if they are all just, the dividend will be but very small for each claimant, as there is only $150,000 to pay that."[242]

By this time the influence of the fur trader had so developed mining in the region of Dubuque, Iowa, Galena, Ill., and southwestern Wisconsin, as to cause an influx of American miners, and here began a new element of progress for Wisconsin. The knowledge of these mines was possessed by the early French explorers, and as the use of firearms spread they were worked more and more by Indians, under the stimulus of the trader. In 1810 Nicholas Boilvin, United States Indian agent at Prairie du Chien, reported that the Indians about the lead mines had mostly abandoned the chase and turned their attention to the manufacture of lead, which they sold to fur traders. In 1825 there were at least 100 white miners in the entire lead region,[243] and by 1829 they numbered in the thousands.

Black Hawk's war came in 1832, and agricultural settlement sought the southwestern part of the State after that campaign. The traders opened country stores, and their establishments were nuclei of settlement.[244]

In Wisconsin the Indian trading post was a thing of the past.

The birch canoe and the pack-horse had had their day in western New York and about Montreal. In Wisconsin the age of the voyageur continued nearly through the first third of this century. It went on in the Far Northwest in substantially the same fas.h.i.+on that has been here described, until quite recently; and in the great North Land tributary to Hudson Bay the _chanson_ of the voyageur may still be heard, and the dog-sledge laden with furs jingles across the snowy plains from distant post to distant post.[245]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 221: In an address before the State Historical Society of Wisconsin, on the Character and Influence of the Fur Trade in Wisconsin (Proceedings, 1889, pp. 86-98), I have given details as to Wisconsin settlements, posts, routes of trade, and Indian location and population in 1820.]

[Footnote 222: Wis. Hist. Colls., XI., 377. Compare the articles used by Radisson, _ante_, p. 29. For La Salle's estimate of amount and kind of goods needed for a post, and the profits thereon, see Penna. Archives, 2d series, VI., 18-19. Brandy was an important item, one beaver selling for a pint. For goods and cost in 1728 see a bill quoted by E.D. Neill, on p. 20, _Mag. West. Hist._, Nov., 1887, Cf. 4 Ma.s.s. Hist. Colls., III., 344; Byrd Ma.n.u.scripts, I., 180 ff.; Minn. Hist. Colls., II., 46; Senate Doc. No. 90, 22d Cong., 1st Sess., II., 42 ff.]

[Footnote 223: Wis. Fur Trade MSS. Cf. Wis. Hist. Colls., XI., 377, and Amer. State Papers, Ind. Affs., II., 360. The amount of liquor taken to the woods was very great. The French Jesuits had protested against its use in vain (Parkman's Old Regime); the United States prohibited it to no purpose. It was an indispensable part of a trader's outfit. Robert Stuart, agent of the American Fur Company at Mackinaw, once wrote to John Lawe, one of the leading traders at Green Bay, that the 56 bbls. of whiskey which he sends is "enough to last two years, and half drown all the Indians he deals with." See also Wis. Hist. Colls., VII., 282; McKenney's Tour to the Lakes, 169, 299-301; McKenney's Memoirs, I., 19-21. An old trader a.s.sured me that it was the custom to give five or six gallons of "grog"--one-fourth water--to the hunter when he paid his credits; he thought that only about one-eighth or one-ninth part of the whole sales was in whiskey.]

[Footnote 224: A light boat sometimes called a "Mackinaw boat," about 32 feet long, by 6-1/2 to 15 feet wide amids.h.i.+ps, and sharp at the ends.]

[Footnote 225: See Wis. Hist. Colls., II., 108.]

[Footnote 226: Minn. Hist. Colls., V., 263.]

[Footnote 227: See Wis. Hist. Colls., VII., 220, 286; III., 235; McKenney's Tour, 194; Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, II., 55. Sometimes a family made 1500 lbs. in a season.]

[Footnote 228: Lewis Ca.s.s in Senate Docs., No. 90, 22d Cong., 1st Sess., II., 1.]

[Footnote 229: See D'Iberville's plans for relocating Indian tribes by denying them credit at certain posts, Margry, IV., 597. The system was used by the Dutch, and the Puritans also; see Weeden, Economic and Social Hist. New Eng., I., 98. In 1765, after the French and Indian war, the Chippeways of Chequamegon Bay told Henry, a British trader, that unless he advanced them goods on credit, "their wives and children would perish; for that there were neither ammunition nor clothing left among them." He distributed goods worth 3000 beaver skins. Henry, Travels, 195-6. Cf. Neill, Minnesota, 225-6; N.Y. Col. Docs., VII., 543; Amer.

State Papers, Ind. Affs., II., 64, 66, 329, 333-5; _North American Review_, Jan., 1826, p. 110.]